International students from SISU's summer camp made a visit to Tencent's Riverside Tower in Shanghai on July 20, while the city was hosting the 2026 World Artificial Intelligence Conference. They were there to see AI technologies up close—and to get a sense of how Chinese tech companies are shaping the field.

01 Gallery Tour

A guide walked the students through Tencent's exhibition hall, tracing the company's journey from the early days of QQ, with its now-iconic penguin mascot, to its current reach as a global digital player. The story—from basic social connectivity to today's sprawling digital ecosystem—read like a condensed history of the Chinese internet itself.

In the AI interactive zone, the students tried out voice assistants and watched digital twin demonstrations. What caught their attention most was the shift taking place in China's tech landscape: moving beyond application-driven models toward genuine hard-tech innovation.

02 AI Talk

After the gallery tour, the students were led to a conference room for a presentation. A Tencent staff member, speaking under the title "China AI – Did You Know?", walked them through the company's large language model development and the broader trends shaping China's AI industry. The talk covered everything from model iterations to real-world applications across sectors. One point that drew particular attention was the speaker's emphasis on the human and social responsibilities that come with technological breakthroughs—a message that clearly resonated with the students.

 

03 Hands-On with AI

The interactive session that followed gave students hands-on experience with Tencent's Hunyuan large language model. They entered a few prompts, selected photos—some taken on SISU's campus, others along the Bund—and let the AI do the rest: arranging the images into a 3D travel diary.

The students eagerly showed off their creations to one another. And these weren't just any travel diaries—they were personal, playful, and uniquely theirs, capturing not just where they'd been, but what they'd seen and felt in China.

04 Open Exchange

The event wound down with a relaxed open exchange. Students from different countries gathered in small groups, chatting about AI and sharing what they loved about Chinese culture. Cameras clicked constantly, capturing smiles and the curiosity behind them.

Looking ahead, SISU plans to build on Shanghai's strength as a tech and innovation hub to offer more opportunities for international students to experience China firsthand. The goal, as the university puts it, is to make "studying at SISU" a warm bridge between China and the rest of the world.

Source: Study at SISU